Narrative Analysis
Qualitative Research
Narrative Analysis
Quotations
“Humans are storytelling organisms who, individually and
collectively, lead storied lives. Thus, the study of narrative is the
study of the ways humans experience the world.”
1990)
(Connelly and Clandinin,
Quotations
Narrative Analysis
“The oldest and most natural of
sense making [are stories]”
(Jonassen & Hernandez-Serrano,
2002, p. 66)
Development
Postmodernist emphasis on reflexivity,
positioning the “self”, understanding identity
Narrative Analysis
Social theory begins to emphasize individual
agency over social structure
Therapeutic culture, understanding the self
Rise of oral history as remedy to systemic
exclusion of marginalized populations in
conventional history
Narrative Analysis
What Do Narratives
Do?
-
Help construct
individual or group
identity
Persuade
Rationalize
Make an argument
Teach a lesson
-
Remember
Mobilize
Offer perspective
Entertain
Cope with or make
sense of disturbing
events/misfortune…..
- What else?
Narrative Analysis
Definition
Narrative Analysis: analysis of a chronologically told story
- analysis of the stories of research subjects, attempting
to understand the relationships between the experiences of the
individuals and their social framework
What Does Narrative Analysis Do?
1. Focuses on “the ways in which
people
make and
use stories to
Narrative
Analysis
interpret the world”
2. Views narratives as interpretive
devices through which people
represent themselves and their
worlds to themselves and to
others
What Does Narrative Analysis Do?
Narrative
Analysis
3. Does
NOT treat
narratives as
stories that transmit a set of facts
about the world
- not interested in whether stories
“true” or not
What Does Narrative Analysis Do?
Analysis
4. Narrative
Views narratives
as social
products that are produced by
people in the context of specific
social, historical and cultural
locations
-
-
What Can be Studies?
- Conversations
Myths
Epics
Narrative Analysis
Legend
- History (memoir, bio)
- Fables
- Comedy
- Tales
- Tragedies
- Novellas
- Dramas
- Mime
- Paintings
News
- Stained glass window
- Corp lit.
- Etc.
What Can be Studies?
“. . .narrative
is present
in every age, in
Narrative
Analysis
every place, in every society; it begins
with the very history of mankind (sic)
and there nowhere is nor has been a
people without narrative…it is simply
there, like life itself’.”
(Barthes, 1982, as cited in Riessman, 2008, p. 4 and Franzosi,
1998 p. 1)
Key Terms
Narrative
Analysis of an
Narrative:
the representation
event or a series of events
- Must have at least one event
present
Key Terms
Narrative
Analysis
Story
: a narrative
with a plot
Plot: causal chain of events that form
a meaningful structure
Key Terms
Patterns:
recurring
forms of patter
Narrative
Analysis
(events)
Themes: sets of patterns
Coding: a system for organizing a
collection of defined
variables/categories
Key Terms
Antenarrative: stories not told in the
Narrative
Analysis and the
proper
plot sequence
mediated coherence preferred in
narrative theory
(beginning, middle, end)
Interview: discursive acts created by
the interviewer and respondent
Key Terms
Temporal
organization:
organization
Narrative
Analysis
of the narrative according to
temporal sequence (time)
3 Approaches
Poetic Approach
 Narrative
Sort narrative
into either
Analysis
1. Epic mode: generates pride,
meant to rouse admiration
2. Romantic mode: lighter,
sentimental quality; addresses
audience’s interest for love,
appreciation, and affection
3 Approaches
Poetic Approach
 Narrative
Sort narrative
into either
Analysis
3. Comic mode: intends to amuse
the audience; may mock as well
4. Tragic mode: generates pity
and sorrow and invites the
audience to feel respect and
compassion
3 Approaches
Poetic Approach
 Narrative
Look for four
main criteria
Analysis
1. Traits of the protagonist(s)
2. Plot focus
3. Major poetic tropes in use
(metaphor, irony, simile, etc)
4. Main emotions at work
3 Approaches
Tripartite Approach:
 Classifies ways of reading
1. Explication: guided by an ambition to
simply understand the text
Narrative Analysis
- What does the text say?
a. Stories may not be complete
b. Stories may be difficult for
outsiders to comprehend
c. Good preparation for
explanation & explorations
3 Approaches
Tripartite Approach:
 Classifies ways of reading
2. Explanation: examines how the text
say what it says by asking:
Narrative Analysis
- What were the intentions of the author?
OR
3 Approaches
Tripartite Approach:
 Classifies ways of reading
2. Explanation: (Cont.)
Narrative Analysis
- How did the reader create meaning and
understanding from the text/what was their
experience?
AND
- What is the process of the text being read?
3 Approaches
Tripartite Approach:
 Classifies ways of reading
2. Explanation: (Cont.)
a. must keep in mind the differences
that exist between an oral and written
text
Narrative Analysis
3 Approaches
Tripartite Approach:
 Classifies ways of reading
3. Exploration: readers bring their own
experiences and lives into the text as if
they were standing in for the author and
ask:
Narrative Analysis
- What does text have to do with me?
- What do I do with this text?
3 Approaches
Tripartite Approach:
 Classifies ways of reading
3. Exploration: (Cont.)
Narrative Analysis
“The social science reader reads in order to
become an author: no matter what school of
explication or explanation he or she belongs
to, no matter whether the reading turns out to
be methodological or inspired in kind.”
(Czarniawska, 2004, p.
71)
3 Approaches
Structural Analysis:
 Emphasizes a shift to the telling, the way
in which a story is told
- Focus is on the language of the story
(grammar) and its form
Narrative Analysis
- How a storyteller’s selection of
particular narrative devices makes it
persuasive.
3 Approaches
Structural Analysis:
 Basic components of a story structure:
1. Abstract (what the story is about)
- can be more than one
Narrative Analysis
2. Orientation (sets the scene – time,
place, characters, and situation)
3. Complicating action (usually a
crisis/conflict or turning point)
- helps layout what happens next
3 Approaches
Structural Analysis:
 Basic components:
Narrative
Analysis
5. Resolution: the outcome of the
plot – the ending
6. Coda: linking section that
returns the story to the present
3 Approaches
Structural Analysis:
 Basic components:
Narrative
Analysis
- Not all stories have all of these
structures and they can occur in
varying sequences
Extra Approach
Deconstructive Approach:
 A stepwise analytical procedure that
pursues the meaning of a text to the
point of exposing the supposed
contradictions and internal oppositions
upon which it is founded
Narrative Analysis
Extra Approach
Deconstructive Approach:


The idea is to re-author a story so that the
hierarchy is resituated and a new balance
of views is attained
- To re-story in order to remove
dualities and margins
Narrative Analysis
Supposes an active participation of the
reader

Focused on criticism/critique
Extra Approach
Deconstructive Approach:
Steps:
Narrative
Analysis
1. List any occurrence of opposite or
contradictory terms used in the story
2. Reinterpret the hierarch in place in the
story
3. Make unheard voices heard
- Who is not being expressed in the story?
Who are the subordinates?
Extra Approach
Deconstructive Approach:
Steps:
Narrative Analysis
4. Stress the other side of the story and
show that each center is in a constant
state of change and disintegration
5. Deny the plot and move it around
6. Find the exceptions and state them in
a way that makes extreme or absurd
Extra Approach
Deconstructive Approach:
Steps:
Narrative Analysis
7. Fill in the blanks with
- What is not being said?
8. Resituate the story beyond its
dualisms, exclude voices or singular
viewpoint
NOTE
Narrative Analysis
There are many, many more ways to
analyze a narrative! This is just a
beginning look at how it can be
done.